Articles

One of the many wonderful things that our British Hindu Community is known for is its unmatched work ethic. Whether its in business or the professions, when we put our minds to a task, no one does it better. In April of this year there was no AHO but after Lord Harries and his racist colleagues publically denigrated our Community, discriminating against us in the most despicable manner, the British Hindu Community turned its attention to this task and the AHO was born.... here's the press release we recently issued with a summary of the milestones reached so far.

Alliance of Hindu Organisations (AHO):

In March 2013 the House of Lords voted in favour of a proposal to include ‘caste’ within the definition of race in the Equalities Act 2010. This was a matter of great concern to the 1 million strong UK Hindu community, who felt that this would stigmatise them and embed the caste system, which the community rejected, within the legal system.

Brief:

The Alliance of Hindu Organisations (AHO) was set up in order to have "One Hindu Voice" when lobbying Parliament on the Caste Legislation.

The AHO Secretariat/Communcation Team led by our Young Hindu Professionals were tasked with actively communicating with Ministers, MPs, Lords and other Stakeholders via face to face meetings, presentations, emails and through letter writing. They also created compelling messages with which to brief the Media, MPs and Lords in the run up to further votes within Parliament on the issue of caste based discrimination. The AHO also worked with Linstock Communications to generate mainstream and social media interest of the Hindu Community's arguments to counter a very active lobby in favour of legislation.

Activity:

In a very short time frame of just 6 weeks, the AHO Secretariat/Communications Team took the Hindu Community's messaging and turned it into a compelling narrative about why the proposed legislation would be detrimental and what the community’s concerns were about its possible implementation. This messaging was distributed to targeted media, all MPs and members of the House of Lords. A dedicated website: www.mycasteishindu.org together with Twitter/Facebook accounts, YouTube Channel containing videos and Email Distribution Lists were also created and used to engage in dialogue with supporters and opponents.

Results:

The Lords’ vote was at first rejected by the Commons and the Lords’ majority in favour of legislation was reduced from over 150 to single figures. However, the proposal did go through after Government flagship legislation was threatened by a stalemate. Nevertheless, the messages created by AHO was used in all Parliamentary debates and was praised by both Ministers and Officials. The AHO public affairs campaign helped secure a number of significant Government concessions on consultation and implementation of the legislation for the Hindu Community. The next stage of AHO's work is to insist that the Government conducts a robust, inclusive and wide ranging consultation period with the Hindu Community to address the community's concerns, and with the blessings of Elders and the comtinuing support of our Hindu Temples and Umbrella organisations we will continue to make sure that the interests of the British Hindu are protected and never again so casually bargained away.